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Blue marlins are among the largest, fastest, and most recognizable fish in the world. Their cobalt blue and silvery white bodies and spear-shaped upper jaws make this big fish stand out in a big ocean. Just how big is a blue marlin? Female blue marlins can grow up to 14 feet (4.3 meters) in length and can weigh more than 1,985 pounds (900 kilograms)! This incredible predator lives a solitary life from the time it is born. The mother lays her eggs in the open water and they float along until hatching with no parental care. From then on, the fish spends most of its life alone, far from land, in the warm surface waters of the Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian Oceans. They can swim long distances and will follow warm ocean currents for hundreds and even thousands of miles. Blue marlins usually feed at the surface where the water is warm, but they have been known to dive deep to feast on squid. To catch prey, blue marlins swim through dense schools of mackerel and tuna at full speed, slashing their upper jaw. They go back to the school to eat their stunned victims.
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Boa constrictors are powerful snakes and stealthy hunters. They live in tropical climates throughout most of Central and South America, where they hunt at night. The boa’s hunting technique is generally to ambush prey, such as rats, birds, monkeys, or wild pigs. The snake swallows its prey whole. Food is digested by strong stomach acids. After a large meal, a boa doesn’t need to eat again for weeks. A boa constrictor grows throughout its whole life, which can be 20 to 30 years. An adult boa will generally weigh more than 100 pounds (45 kilograms) and grow to about 13 feet (4 meters) long. Boa constrictors tend to live alone. Mother boas give birth to about 60 babies at a time! A baby boa is on its own from the start. It is born with the instinct, or built-in knowledge, of how to hunt. It also has an instinct to hide to stay safe from predators. The baby boa’s diet changes as it grows. The bigger it gets, the bigger its preferred prey becomes.
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The pileated woodpecker is one of the largest woodpecker species in North America and its look is unmistakable—a large black bird with white on each side of its neck and a red crest on its head. When it flies, white flashes are visible under its wings. The sound of the pileated woodpecker’s hammering carries a long distance through the woods where they live. They drum to attract mates and to establish the boundaries of their territory—warning other males away. They use their beaks to peck and dig under bark to find carpenter ants, beetle larvae, and other insects and will often dig large, rectangular holes in trees to uncover their meals. Some holes are so big that they weaken small, young trees. The birds also strip pieces of bark from trees looking for food. Generally, however, pileated woodpeckers help keep a forest healthy by eating wood-boring insects. A nesting pair of pileated woodpeckers usually makes a nesting hole in a large, older tree. During the day, both parents take turns incubating, or sitting on, the eggs to keep them warm. At night, only the male incubates the eggs. They generally lay four eggs at a time, which take about two weeks to hatch.
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Coyotes once lived only in prairies and deserts of the western United States and in Mexico. Today they thrive almost anywhere in North America. Adaptability—that’s the main reason for the success of the coyote. A coyote is naturally adaptable because it eats such a wide range of food. If it can’t find mice or voles to eat, lizards, insects, or even garbage will do. In Native American stories coyotes are clever and tricky. Some coyotes kill calves and lambs on people’s ranches and farms. For a century people have tried to kill coyotes by using poison, traps, and guns. Still coyotes continue to thrive. This trickster of Native American tales often gets fooled—but it always bounces back. Coyotes vary in body size from 32 to 37 inches (81 to 94 centimeters). Their tails can be up to 16 inches long (41 centimeters).
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Pufferfish can inflate into a ball shape to evade predators. Also known as blowfish, these clumsy swimmers fill their elastic stomachs with huge amounts of water (and sometimes air) and blow themselves up to several times their normal size. Some species also have spines on their skin to ward off predators. Even if a predator gobbles up a puffer before it inflates, it won’t enjoy the snack. Most pufferfish contain a toxic substance that makes them foul tasting and potentially deadly to other fish. The toxin is deadly to humans. There is enough poison in one pufferfish to kill 30 adult humans, and there is no known antidote. In Japan, they are called fugu and are a very expensive, delicious treat. They are prepared only by trained, licensed fugu chefs. Most puffers are found in tropical and subtropical ocean waters, but some species live in brackish and even fresh water. Some species of pufferfish are considered vulnerable due to pollution, habitat loss, and overfishing, but most populations are considered stable.
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National Geographic Kids
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Indian peafowl are a species in a group of birds called pheasants. The males are called peacocks, while the females are called peahens. Together, they are peafowl. Peafowl are among the largest of all birds that fly. (Ostriches, emus, and other such birds are bigger, but cannot fly.) The beautiful feathers that cover the tails of a peacock are 5 feet (1.5 meters) long—longer than the bird’s body—and can be displayed in a spectacular fan of brilliant colors. These long feathers actually grow from the bird’s back not the tail. He elevates them by raising the much shorter tail feathers underneath them. Peahens are more drab than their male counterparts, with mostly brown on their back with a white belly. Females don’t have long tail feathers, but they do have a crest on their head and green neck feathers. Indian peafowl are native to India and Sri Lanka, in South Asia. They’ve been introduced to other countries, usually as exhibits in parks, zoos, and nature centers or as domestic pets. The head and body of adult peafowl range from 3 to 4 feet long and their tail can be 5 feet long.
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The blue whale is the largest mammal in the world. A blue whale calf weighs two tons (1,814 kilograms) at birth and gains an extra 200 pounds (91 kilograms) each day of its first year. Blue whales are able to breathe air, but they are very comfortable in the ocean waters where buoyancy helps to support their incredible bulk. These mammals are found in all the world’s oceans and often swim in small groups or alone. These giant creatures feed on tiny shrimplike animals called krill. Only a few thousand blue whales are believed to swim the world’s oceans. They were hunted for many years for their blubber and oil, and they were almost hunted to extinction. They were protected under the 1966 International Whaling Convention and are now considered to be an endangered species.
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An American goldfinch soars through the warm spring air, it’s yellow feathers reflecting the sun. Suddenly the bird opens its mouth and chirps a call that sounds like “po-ta-to-chip.” This flier isn’t looking for a salty snack. It’s using this vocalization to communicate with its flock. The bird flies on, continuing its delicious call.
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Snowy plovers are small shorebirds that dash in and out of waves at the beach. While it looks like they are playing, these chunky little white birds are actually chasing after a meal of small insects and crustaceans. These small birds have rounded heads with steep foreheads and short necks. Their bills are black and they have large eyes. They have short black legs and dark gray to black feet. As plovers mature, their feathers change. Typically, their feathers are snowy white, hence their name, with black, brown, and gray markings on wings and head. They have patches of brown or black on their shoulders. Snowy plovers feast on beetles, flies, marine worms, crabs, clams, sand hoppers, seeds, and aquatic insects. While they search for food plovers will run, stop, look, and then peck and poke at plants and the sand. Plovers will run into swarms of flies with their bills open and snapping, trying to grab a bite. They nest on the sand on sparsely vegetated coastal beaches and lakeshores and also nest near man-made wastewater ponds and reservoirs. They often line their sand nests with seashells. Many sandy beaches are raked to make them attractive to humans and beach grasses are planted to control beach erosion. As a result, plovers‘ breeding numbers have decreased as their beach habitats and breeding areas are used for fun and recreation. Both parents will take care of the large eggs, but females often take over day duty and the males take over at night. Newly hatched snowy plover chicks look like fluffy white cotton balls.
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